


Child of the New Market

by SilverRosesAndDragons



Category: The Demon's Lexicon - Sarah Rees Brennan
Genre: Gen, No Plot/Plotless, Post-Canon, United Goblin Market, i don't know what this is, is this fandom even still active?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 01:48:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29306013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverRosesAndDragons/pseuds/SilverRosesAndDragons
Summary: Lydie's thoughts on the Market under Mae's rule and the trilogy's MC's a few years later.





	Child of the New Market

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! If you're reading this, then apparently I'm not the only one that's still caught up in these books. In that case, yay! I'm not alone!

The Crawford siblings were two of the most powerful people in Britain’s magical underworld. James Crawford ran a rather large magician’s circle out of London, the Adventurine Circle, while Mavis Crawford was the leader of the expanded British Goblin Market. The British market was the only one in the world where non-magical people, potion makers, pied pipers, necromancers, messengers, and magicians all lived together, and the rest of the world didn’t like the way we did things, as was obvious especially when there were attacks, though they were never successful. 

I grew up in the Market before anyone with magic was allowed to live with us; when we moved every month so the magicians wouldn’t find us. Back then, I had to hide my magic. My sister Sin warned me that if anyone found out that I was a young magician, we would get kicked out. And at one point, we did. For a while, we lived away from the people I’d known my whole life. But Mae and Jamie Crawford, along with Alan and Nick Ryves, made it so the Market was united with the magicians and the other semi-magical people. A lot changed in the Market after Jamie got control of the Circle and they joined us. We no longer needed to move around all the time to stay safe: It was safer to stay within the Adventurine Circle’s territory, away from the other magician’s circles. So the search started for somewhere we could settle permanently. I remember them talking about how to pay for it; the amount of open space we needed would be expensive. I don’t think anyone was supposed to hear them arguing about the money, but I was ten at the time, and very shy and quiet, so I doubt they even thought about what I would hear. They sold everything except Mezentius House, where the possessed are locked up to keep them away from people, to pay for the property they bought. They sold the Obsidian Circle’s houses, the Adventurine Circle’s houses, the Queen’s Corsair, they even sold the Crawford siblings’ childhood home. They got every member of the Market to give them any excess money that they could, for the promise of a permanent home. 

With the money they raised, they bought an estate. That was the best word to describe it. There’s a very large house, a mansion really, that has a ton of bedrooms. The property is thirty acres of forests and fields, with plenty of space right behind the house for trailers from the Market caravan, for people that didn’t want to live in the house. There was a large area of the land that had been flattened and designated for a garden, and in it, we grew all of the ingredients the potion makers could ever need, and quite a bit of the food we ate. We had a chicken coop that gave us fresh eggs, too. Once the garden got started, it significantly reduced the amount of money we had to spend on food. Once a month we still held the Goblin Market, where tourists and regular visitors and people with supernatural problems could come and see the magic. The Market was always held on the same patch of land at the back of the property, where an access road and parking lot had been built to keep guests from going through our living areas. And then there were the training grounds, where magicians could practice spells, fighters could train with weapons, and anyone could practice pretty much anything. Part of the training grounds was set up for sport, and especially the young members of the Market liked to play games out there. It was all very impressive, and it was certainly the best place I’d ever lived. Especially because I didn’t have to move schools all the time anymore. 

My room in the Market house was bigger than our caravan trailer had been, and I only had one roommate. Her name was Lottie, and she was thirteen like me. Her mom was a potion maker, and they’d been part of the market for even less time than some of the potion makers because her mom hadn’t believed the peace would last more than a few weeks. They joined two months later, though, and I was really glad, because I liked Lottie. She was my best friend. 

For as much as Mae and Jamie and Alan and Nick and Seb and even Sin seemed so mature and responsible much of the time, sometimes I forgot that they weren’t just normal young adults. Because my sister Sin was friends with them, I saw a side of them that they didn’t show to most of the Market. Sometimes they would all get together in one of their rooms in the evening and play board games, which they let me join occasionally. Sometimes Mae and Sin would take me shopping in town, Jamie and Seb would help me with my magic, Alan would read to me, Nick would teach me about knives and swords. Sin had been a bit protective at first, hadn’t wanted me to learn about magic or weapons because it could be dangerous, but she came around. Jamie had reminded her that my magic wasn’t going to go away no matter what we did, and it would be better for me to learn to control it. Nick hadn’t really cared to convince her, but I’d told her I wanted to learn, and she’d let me. She’d said something about being surprised Nick cared, but I didn’t understand what she meant. He didn’t seem to care that much about teaching me.

Since we’d stayed with the Ryves brothers when we got kicked out of the Market, I’d been fascinated by Nick. He was the demon that had a permanent body, and when I’d been scared of the Magicians’ Circle coming for me, he’d pretty much said they wouldn't get me while he was there. I’d never thought a demon would protect a human before, but he’d offered to. So I followed him around sometimes, just watching him, trying to figure out what he felt in different situations. He obviously had emotions, and cared about Alan and Jamie and Mae in his own way, but I was curious what other emotions he felt, that he didn’t let other people see. One day when I was observing him he was practicing his knives, though he usually favored his sword, I’d noticed. And he’d said, without looking at me, “If you’re going to be here you might as well learn something.” When I hadn’t responded in any way, shocked because he never acknowledged my presence, he’d turned to look at me. “Well, come here, then.” So I’d done what he’d asked, and my training had begun. Nick, the demon boy, taught me about balance points, correct grip and stance, and throwing, stabbing, and slicing with knives. He taught me about knives, but I was never allowed to touch his sword.

I learned a lot in the new Goblin Market, and not just about magic and swords. Every member of the Market had chores, starting at about five years old. We rotated through lots of different things until we had some understanding of all of them, and until we found what we were good at and liked doing. So I learned about cooking and cleaning, laundry, gardening, changing light bulbs, mowing the lawn, taking care of animals, and more. And then there was school, where I learned more than I had at school when we were always moving. Back then, I’d been constantly trying to catch up on what other kids had already learned, but staying in one place, I came to actually enjoy school. I mostly hung out with other Market kids at school, because so much of my life was a secret from the non-Market kids. So at break, a small group of us Market kids, some with magic and some without, all hung out together because we couldn’t really be ourselves around the other kids. Sometimes, when there was something big going on at the Market, or a decision was being made, they would ask if I knew anything about it, because my sister was friends with our leaders. I knew it wasn’t good to spread rumors, though, so I would just tell them that no one really talked business when I was around, and the other kids would shrug and we would go back to whatever we were doing.

There were many good things about having so many different kinds of people in the same place. Everyone brought something new to the Market, a new idea or ability or technique, and everyone was better off for it. It was also good that this unity meant that I could still be part of the Market, even though I was born a magician. And sometimes there were disputes, and Mae and the leaders of the different peoples had to work together to solve them, but they did resolve them. And at the end of the day, we were all one group, one very-extended family, and we all ate together in the dining room or around a fire outside. And on Market nights, we all showed off and made money for the Market and for ourselves. 

Sin and her friends were all happy, too. Sin was happier than she’d been since Mom fell, and it gave me hope. Before, it hadn’t seemed like there was much of a chance for me to have a happy future, being a magician living in the Market, but with the new, united Market, I thought everything could work out okay. And it was nice to see the people I looked up to happy. I looked up to Jamie and Seb and Mae and Nick and Alan and Sin, and they all loved and were loved in so many different ways. They all seemed to be what Sin described as “in love,” and of course they all loved each other like family, like I loved Sin and Toby and my friend Lottie. For the first time in my life, I felt truly safe, and like there was more than one person in the world that would look out for me. It felt good.

**Author's Note:**

> If you read this far, thank you for reading! I have a few other ideas I might share if anyone still reads in this fandom, so let me know if you'd like more.
> 
> Kudos and comments are always appreciated.


End file.
